iris123

It is interesting on this subject to note that an Australian newspaper on 21st February 1928 had the headline Speedway in Britain The Australians Keith McKay and 'Billy' Galloway helped to organise and participate in, a successful first cinders track motorcycle race meeting in Britain at Loughton (Essex), today(19thFeb). The attendance numbered 10,000 from London and the Home Counties. A thrilling exhibition of daring and skilful riding was given

Trouble is Vince it wasn’t always like that . Back in the 70s and 80s a lot of clubs had a real slump in attendances . The interesting bit is how the sport was rebuilt again after some of those terrible disasters and the dark days of hooliganism etc

In fact there were a group of female riders in Australia before speedway in the UK started.

Well it certainly is hotter in Australia the past week or so than it was 10 years ago. Who say’s global warming is not happening ?

Guess it could well have been his mother’s brother, so didn’t have the Waterman surname

Often feel it was a pity seeing as some of those pioneer riders lived into the 70s and 80s that they weren’t interviewed more. You started your career as author a tick too late

What makes me question this though is the line up for the 1st Adelaide meeting, which was the 1928 qualifier for the finals the next weekend. It seems quite organised in that each State was represented. For the mile championship and the same riders were swapped around for the 2 mile championship. Also seen a few times that Schlam is listed as Syd.? Frank Duckett (Adelaide) rode against Sprouts Elder (US) Syd. Schlam (W.A) v V. Huxley (Qu) A. Taylor (Adelaide) v C.Datson W.A) + B.Morris (Vic) P.Dean (NSW) v H.Managham (ex- New Zealand!!) And as I mentioned at least Huxley left Brisbane a few weeks before and had a couple of meetings in Sydney( v Van Praag etc) on his way to the Aussie Championships Again, more research needed

Thanks for that norbold. And happy Xmas

Good to know what the fancied teams are. Just a quick glance and I am on holiday for the Krosno meeting. But will try and get to more than one I hope. If the Poznań meeting is on the Saturday it will be better for me

From my quick browsing I think that is the reason greyhounds are banned in the US, rather than cruelty. At least in some States . Don’t quote me on that though

Looking forward to making a meeting or two in Wittstock. Added to Vojens back in the Danish league I might have a busy speedway year

Not sure why the first post mentions policeman, but of course Sprouts Elder did. join the Californian highway patrol when his career ended. Long before Bruce Penhall became an actor and portrayed one

As an aside and further to the pre- world championship days, even pre-High Beech days. Does anyone know the basis on how a rider entered the Aussie championships in 1925-28... just that I see in 1928 Vic Huxley left Brisbane via Sydney to compete in the Championship, but other top riders like Arthur, Lamont etc didn’t . Bit of a mystery at the moment whether a rider was chosen from a track possibly

Billy Galloway became an instructor at the Scottish school of hairdressing. In fact I think he was working as a barber on a ship when he heard that speedway was going to get started in GB and that is how he became involved in the birth of speedway in the country

That is why on my first post to the figure of a 1,000 dogs being killed etc I asked if it was the whole story on the Oxford thread. Of course people just reading a news article are going to take it as the truth and be horrified

Not sure you can take all these comments as facts or from experts. I guess if you say horses are forced to race and that is cruel, you can say pet dogs are forced to run and pick up sticks !!! It isn’t behavior you would see a wild dog or a wolf doing ...

Just to get back to this point and wondering looking at the results. Not wanting to contradict, more clarification Looking at the Davies Park handicap classifications, which I assume is a ranking of how good a rider is, it was as follows in January of 1928 just before the riders came to the UK Scratch: Huxley + Lamont 1s Arthur 2s Pearce 3s Smythe and Cecil Brown 4s Buchanan 5s S.Bayly, J. Bishop, S. Durston, B.Scott, A.Pritchard, L.Lawrence 6s J.Binney, H.Hastings, B.Unwin 7s F.Hore 8s B.Jones, B.Faber, H.Meston, L.Percival,R.Anderson Of course this is just one track and it is possible Frank Arthur felt wrongly classified as he opted to go from scratch in at least one meeting !!! And in his heat he almost made up the 7 second advantage that Fred Hore had over him, but his bike played up a bit on the last lap..... What is also interesting from a technical point, is that the cut-out was being introduced at Davies Park by early 1928 and some riders were ignoring the ruling. So the bikes was pretty much the basic 'speedway' bike by the time the riders came over to the UK, as I remember posting a link that stated Indian at least were producing dirt track racers with no brakes fairly early on. From memory maybe even in the 1910s

Was also a female Japanese rider that rode in Australia in the early 60s. Must have been a contemporary of Jimmy Ogisu when they were still riding on dirt. The first female riding Oz dirt tracks since 1928 (Fay Taylour ?)

How is it like anything ‘speedway included’ when talking about 1,000s of dogs being killed ? Tell me how many speedway riders are put down every year ? Even if it is hundreds that I don’t know about, that is way way less than the number of greyhounds by my reckoning

That has got to be one of the weirdest ideas I have ever heard. It is cruel not to breed and deny something(one) the chance of a life!!! So in your eyes someone with no kids is crueler than someone with one and those scroungers with about 12 kids and living on the dole are the kindest people on the planet ? I really hope I am just confused here and got the wrong end of the stick

Are you saying horse racing trumps greyhounds 1,000 -6,000 dogs killed a year ? This is horrendous Sort of like the battle of the serial killers !!!!

Also interesting to see there was a group of female riders in Australia in those pre-UK days. At the opening meeting at the Sydney Showground a match race between two women from of all places West Maitland. Mrs. Lee and Miss Nora Stacey, which Mrs. Lee won comfortably !! A few weeks later Mrs. Lee won what was titled the Women’s Championship of Australia against a Mrs. Cridland

Thought a few years back there were big plans for the sport in Switzerland !!! What ever happened?

Always loved the Templeton brothers, even though their hey-day was past by the time I really got into speedway. Tough as old boots RIP

Yes. Like you I have never really had a problem with greyhound racing nor really given it much thought, but this and the Oxford thread really has highlighted a big problem and I wonder how long it can all carry on